Interactive navigation¶
All figure windows come with a navigation toolbar, which can be used to navigate through the data set. Here is a description of each of the buttons at the bottom of the toolbar
- The
Home
,Forward
andBack
buttons - These are akin to a web browser's home, forward and back controls.
Forward
andBack
are used to navigate back and forth between previously defined views. They have no meaning unless you have already navigated somewhere else using the pan and zoom buttons. This is analogous to trying to clickBack
on your web browser before visiting a new page orForward
before you have gone back to a page -- nothing happens.Home
always takes you to the first, default view of your data. Again, all of these buttons should feel very familiar to any user of a web browser.
- The
Pan/Zoom
button This button has two modes: pan and zoom. Click the toolbar button to activate panning and zooming, then put your mouse somewhere over an axes. Press the left mouse button and hold it to pan the figure, dragging it to a new position. When you release it, the data under the point where you pressed will be moved to the point where you released. If you press 'x' or 'y' while panning the motion will be constrained to the x or y axis, respectively. Press the right mouse button to zoom, dragging it to a new position. The x axis will be zoomed in proportionately to the rightward movement and zoomed out proportionately to the leftward movement. The same is true for the y axis and up/down motions. The point under your mouse when you begin the zoom remains stationary, allowing you to zoom in or out around that point as much as you wish. You can use the modifier keys 'x', 'y' or 'CONTROL' to constrain the zoom to the x axis, the y axis, or aspect ratio preserve, respectively.
With polar plots, the pan and zoom functionality behaves differently. The radius axis labels can be dragged using the left mouse button. The radius scale can be zoomed in and out using the right mouse button.
- The
Zoom-to-rectangle
button - Click this toolbar button to activate this mode. Put your mouse somewhere over an axes and press a mouse button. Define a rectangular region by dragging the mouse while holding the button to a new location. When using the left mouse button, the axes view limits will be zoomed to the defined region. When using the right mouse button, the axes view limits will be zoomed out, placing the original axes in the defined region.
- The
Subplot-configuration
button - Use this tool to configure the appearance of the subplot: you can stretch or compress the left, right, top, or bottom side of the subplot, or the space between the rows or space between the columns.
- The
Save
button - Click this button to launch a file save dialog. You can save
files with the following extensions:
png
,ps
,eps
,svg
andpdf
.
Navigation Keyboard Shortcuts¶
The following table holds all the default keys, which can be overwritten by use of your matplotlibrc (#keymap.*).
Command | Keyboard Shortcut(s) |
---|---|
Home/Reset | h or r or home |
Back | c or left arrow or backspace |
Forward | v or right arrow |
Pan/Zoom | p |
Zoom-to-rect | o |
Save | ctrl + s |
Toggle fullscreen | f or ctrl + f |
Close plot | ctrl + w |
Close all plots | shift + w |
Constrain pan/zoom to x axis | hold x when panning/zooming with mouse |
Constrain pan/zoom to y axis | hold y when panning/zooming with mouse |
Preserve aspect ratio | hold CONTROL when panning/zooming with mouse |
Toggle major grids | g when mouse is over an axes |
Toggle minor grids | G when mouse is over an axes |
Toggle x axis scale (log/linear) | L or k when mouse is over an axes |
Toggle y axis scale (log/linear) | l when mouse is over an axes |
If you are using matplotlib.pyplot
the toolbar will be created
automatically for every figure. If you are writing your own user
interface code, you can add the toolbar as a widget. The exact syntax
depends on your UI, but we have examples for every supported UI in the
matplotlib/examples/user_interfaces
directory. Here is some
example code for GTK+ 3:
import gi
gi.require_version('Gtk', '3.0')
from gi.repository import Gtk
from matplotlib.figure import Figure
from matplotlib.backends.backend_gtk3agg import FigureCanvas
from matplotlib.backends.backend_gtk3 import (
NavigationToolbar2GTK3 as NavigationToolbar)
win = Gtk.Window()
win.connect("destroy", lambda x: Gtk.main_quit())
win.set_default_size(400,300)
win.set_title("Embedding in GTK")
vbox = Gtk.VBox()
win.add(vbox)
fig = Figure(figsize=(5,4), dpi=100)
ax = fig.add_subplot(111)
ax.plot([1,2,3])
canvas = FigureCanvas(fig) # a Gtk.DrawingArea
vbox.pack_start(canvas, True, True, 0)
toolbar = NavigationToolbar(canvas, win)
vbox.pack_start(toolbar, False, False, 0)
win.show_all()
Gtk.main()